Biotechnology industry pioneer Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw named to USP Board of Trustees

A biotechnology entrepreneur and executive with global standing, Shaw will help guide USP’s policies, finances and strategic direction as a member of the Board. In addition to her role on USP’s Board of Trustees, Shaw will serve as a member of the USP Biologics Advisory Group.

USP is a scientific nonprofit organization that develops standards for the identity, strength, quality and purity of medicines, medicinal ingredients, botanical medicinal ingredients, dietary supplements, food ingredients, and compounded medicines manufactured, prepared, distributed and consumed worldwide. Headquartered in the United States, USP operates facilities with laboratory and customer support operations in Brazil, India and China, with a sales office in Switzerland.

“As a businesswoman, public health advocate and philanthropist, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw has innovated and campaigned tirelessly for affordable medications on behalf of patients in India and worldwide for decades,” said Dr. Roger L. Williams, chief executive officer of USP. “We are honored to have her serve on USP’s Board of Trustees, where her leadership and expertise will be utilized to help guide the organization as it advances its mission to improve the health of people around the world through public standards and related programs that help ensure the quality, safety, and benefit of medicines and foods.”

Under Shaw’s stewardship, Biocon has evolved since its inception in 1978 as an industrial enzymes company to a fully integrated biopharmaceutical enterprise with a research focus on diabetes, oncology and auto-immune disease. During this transition, Biocon established two subsidiaries: Syngene (1994) to provide development support services for discovery research, and Clinigene (2000) to cater to services in clinical development. In 2004, Shaw started the Biocon Foundation. Shaw has been named among TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world and Economic Times placed her as one of India Inc.’s top 10 most powerful women CEOs for 2012.

Shaw chairs the Government of Karnataka's Vision Group on Biotechnology and serves as a member of various governmental, scientific, business and academic advisory groups, including the Advisory Council of the Government’s Department of Biotechnology in India, the Prime Minister’s Council on Trade & Industry in India, the U.S.-India CEO Forum, the governing and general bodies of the Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission, the India Advisory Board for the USC Viterbi School of Engineering, and the honorary Board of Advisors of The National Society of High School Scholars, USA. She also serves on the Global Advisory Committee for Earth Day Network’s “Women and the Green Economy” (WAGE™) campaign that engages female business, government and NGO leaders to help create and develop a global green economy.

Shaw is the recipient of several prestigious awards including the Economic Times “Businesswoman of the Year,” the Veuve Clicquot Initiative for Economic Development Award for Asia, Ernst & Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year Award for Life Sciences & Healthcare, “Technology Pioneer” recognition by World Economic Forum, Nikkei Asia Prize for regional growth and the Indian Chamber of Commerce Lifetime Achievement Award. She has received two national awards in India—PADMASHRI (1989) and PADMA BHUSHAN (2005)—which were presented to her by the President of India for her efforts in industrial biotechnology.

Shaw received a graduate honors degree in zoology from Bangalore University (1973) and qualified as a master brewer from Ballarat University, Australia (1975). She also holds honorary doctorates from Ballarat University, the University of Abertay, Dundee, U.K. (2007), the University of Glasgow, U.K. (2008), Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, U.K. (2008), the National University of Ireland (2012) and Trinity College, Dublin (2012).

Shaw is the second non-U.S. member of the USP Board of Trustees. The first was Dr. Judith Oulton, who served on the USP Board of Trustees in the 2005–2010 cycle. Shaw is honored in this cycle as being an appointed member of the Board, which is allowed for three distinguished members of the professional community by virtue of changes to USP’s By-laws that occurred at the 2010 Convention. The decision to seek Shaw was made by the USP Board’s Governance Committee, chaired by Dr. Marilyn Speedie, and endorsed unanimously by the USP Board.